The emergence of artificial intelligence in education has initiated a revolutionary change in the history of human knowledge and learning. Everywhere, in classrooms, at university, at workplaces, and in research facilities, artificial intelligence technologies are increasingly integrated into people's intellectual activity. Whether it is writing essays, solving mathematical problems, summarising academic articles, or creating presentations, artificial intelligence is increasingly engaged in tasks that used to require extensive intellectual effort and reflection.
But the real question is how this development would affect people and learning in the future.
Traditionally, education systems have always been built on the premise that intellectual effort is a necessary part of learning and human development. To master skills, solve problems, and produce something new, individuals had to read, reflect, understand, and think. Essay writing, problem solving or data analysis involved not just getting an answer or creating a particular piece of text but learning to think, reason and persevere intellectually. Learning was once understood as the struggle of cognition.
Now, artificial intelligence is changing all of that:thanks to the emergence of artificial intelligence platforms, students can produce an excellent essay within just a few seconds. Summarising research articles, programing solutions, data analysis, literature review, and even creative projects can all be completed instantaneously with the help of the machine. While once students needed days of contemplation and effort to complete their tasks, now they require only several mouse clicks. Artificial intelligence thus seems to be substituting intellectual effort and reflection with quick automation.
This process is called outsourcing intellectual labour. Traditionally, outsourcing of any kind of human labour is done using machines. Agriculture, the transport industry, and other branches were automated during the Industrial Revolution. Digital technologies have automated the administration and processing of information. However, the current revolution introduces something unprecedented by outsourcing cognitive labor, traditionally considered the realm of human intellect, creativity, analysis, and reflection.
Obviously, the impact of this development on education is huge.Firstly, there is the possibility of the erosion of deep learning processes. People usually develop an understanding by struggling with knowledge, reflecting on difficulties, and going through numerous stages of learning and practice. But relying heavily on artificial intelligence could deprive students of the opportunity to experience these developmental stages. It does not mean only plagiarism, but intellectual stagnation and passivity.
In many cases, artificial intelligence could contribute to the emergence of what is called "cognitive dependency."However, the issue of AI technologies cannot be viewed solely from a negative perspective. There are also huge possibilities offered by such innovations in the field of learning and education. Thanks to the emergence of AI, knowledge can become widely accessible to people. People with disabilities can be assisted in learning. Foreign students can get the opportunity to write and communicate in a foreign language. Artificial intelligence could be used for personalising educational processes.
The main issue is not whether artificial intelligence should be introduced into the educational system, but how to integrate it properly. Clearly, banning these technologies at school is unrealistic. They have already penetrated all aspects of social life and the professional environment, and it is impossible to prohibit them. What educational institutions need to do instead is change the perception of education and learning in the conditions of automation of information production.
What needs to be done is shifting away from memorising facts and figures and moving towards intellectual skills. Since artificial intelligence can retrieve facts, generate summaries, and write elementary essays, the learning system of the future should focus on developing critical skills such as analysis, fact evaluation, relevant questioning, interpretation of reality, and sound judgment.
Learning assessment techniques also need to be changed in the case of artificial intelligence. The homework assignments, essays, or other tasks requiring students' work at home cannot be used as a measure of their abilities. Schools and universities may have to resort to tests including oral examinations, project work, group discussion, and reflective writing.
The development of AI is also changing our understanding of intellectual work and labour.Traditionally, this type of labour carried the highest prestige due to the scarcity of human experts who conducted analysis, wrote research papers, drafted legal statements, and did journalism. Artificial intelligence, however, can easily substitute human labor and perform these tasks instantaneously. It does not mean that human experts would not be needed, but that they would not be necessary as often as before.
In the era of artificial intelligence, human expertise may be highly valued for the unique qualities people can offer: their ability to reason ethically, creatively, empathetically, and independently.
Perhaps, the best combination in the future could be the synthesis of human intelligence and AI algorithms.
Thus, the rise of artificial intelligence raises a number of moral and ethical issues. If AI plays a huge part in student work, who will be regarded as the author of the assignment? How much help should be provided? In an age of machine-made essays and papers, what will be the criteria of originality?
These questions are no longer technological questions. They are also philosophical questions about human nature, morality, and the essence of education.
There is also a serious problem of intellectual dependence. If all critical tasks are done with the help of the machine, there may be a possibility that all major intellectual power will become concentrated in the hands of tech companies controlling the algorithms. Individual intellectual independence would decrease, and all reasoning could be shaped by algorithms. Individuals might start consuming machine-generated opinions instead of creating their own.
Thus, in the conditions of the AI revolution, humanity faces a new challenge: preventing artificial intelligence from destroying human intellectual capacity.
In the future, the most successful countries will be those that maintain human intellectual skills while effectively utilising technological capabilities. The task of education should remain the cultivation of the mind.
Dr.Serajul I. Bhuiyan is a professor and former chair of the Department of Journalism and Mass Communications, Savannah State University, Savannah, GA USA.
sibhuiyan@yahoo.com